Intra-task variability of trunk coordination during a rate-controlled bipedal dance jump

In this study, we investigated trunk coordination during rate-controlled bipedal vertical dance jumps. The aims of the study were to investigate the pattern of coordination and the magnitude of coordination variability within jump phases and relative to phase-defining events during the jump. Lumbar and thoracic kinematics were collected from seven dancers during a series of jumps at 95 beats per minute. The vector coding technique was used to quantify the pattern and variability of trunk coordination. Coordination was predominantly anti-phase during propulsion and landing. Mean coordination variability peaked just before the landing phase and at the transition from landing to propulsion phases, and was lowest during the propulsion phase just before toe-off. The results indicate that peaks in variability could be explained by task and phase-specific biomechanical demands.     

Cinders in Snow? Indigenous Teacher Identities in Formation

The identity work engaged in by Indigenous teachers1 1. We use the term ‘Indigenous’ here to include Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people working in Australian schools, although most of our informants to date are from Victoria, NSW and Queensland, who do not use the term ‘Indigenous’ when identifying themselves and their communities, preferring ‘Aboriginal’, ‘Koori’ or ‘Murri’.. View all notes in school settings is highlighted in a study of Australian Indigenous teachers. The construction of identity in home and community relationships intersects with and can counteract the take up of a preferred identity in the workplace. In this paper we analyse data from interviews with Indigenous teachers, exploring the interplay between culture and identity. We foreground the binary nature of racial assignment in schools, demonstrate how this offers contradictory constructions of identity for Indigenous teachers, and note the effects of history, culture and location in the process of forming a teaching ‘self’.     

Analysing the professional development of teaching and learning from a political ethics of care perspective

This paper uses Tronto's political ethics of care as a normative framework to evaluate a model of teaching and learning professional development. This framework identifies five integrated moral elements of care – attentiveness, responsibility, competence, responsiveness and trust. This paper explicates on each of these elements to evaluate the piloting and implementation of a teaching and learning professional development model at a South African higher education institution. The political ethics of care was found to be a useful normative framework for a group of higher educators to reflect on the process of engaging in teaching and learning professional development in that it revealed the importance of differential power relations, the importance of working collaboratively and being attentive to the needs of both caregivers and care receivers.     

College Women Mentoring Adolescent Girls: The Relationship between Mentor Peer Support and Mentee Outcomes

In this study, we examined the effectiveness of peer support for college women mentors who engaged in one-to-one and group mentoring with at-risk adolescent girls. Using data from 162 mentoring pairs, results suggested that mentor support positively predicted mentees’ self-reported improvement after a year of mentoring. An examination of mentees’ self-esteem outcomes revealed that mentor peer support was associated with higher outcomes only for those mentees who had higher pre-program scores; for those with below average pre-scores, mentor support was associated with lower self-esteem. Taken together, these results indicate that mentor support may serve as an important function beyond ongoing training, though its effectiveness may vary based on mentee characteristics. Implications are discussed.     

Situated Self-Regulation: Modeling the Interrelationships Among Instruction,Assessment, Learning Strategies and Academic Performance

To succeed academically, college students must actively construct course information, synthesize this information with information from texts and other resources, understand this information so that they can succeed on various forms of assessments and ultimately retain this information for the long term. While the complexity of these demands has been modeled somewhat metaphorically, there has been little ecologically valid research into learning in authentic classroom contexts. The present study examines the interrelationships among student perceptions of the learning context, test complexity, study strategies, and academic performance. Results of a path analysis demonstrated that perceptions of the teaching format and test complexity were positively related to the study strategies reported, and these study strategies were further related to the reported course performance.     

Learning about domestic violence: young people's responses to a Healthy Relationships programme

This paper reports on an evaluation of a drama‐based Healthy Relationships programme on domestic violence delivered on a pilot basis to Year 8 pupils. The programme included a play delivered by a local theatre‐in‐education company followed by a series of weekly workshops. Eighty‐five pupils in a secondary school located in an area with high rates of social exclusion participated in the programme and the evaluation. Pupils completed questionnaires immediately before and after the programme and one year after the programme had finished. Thirteen pupils also took part in gendered discussion groups, which considered their views and opinions concerning the play and the workshops. The evaluation indicated that the programme was successful in enhancing pupils' understandings of domestic violence up to one year after delivery. Pupils responded well to the use of drama as a medium for learning, and some young people were able to demonstrate that they had developed positive ideas about healthy relationships. However, there was evidence of uncertainly for some young people with regard to the gendered nature of domestic violence following the programme. The discussion highlights this issue and identifies additional recommendations for both future research and future programmes.     

Networking and Distance Learning for Teachers: a classification of possibilities

ABSTRACT

Computer based communication technologies, or what could be more conveniently called networking, are bringing new possibilities into teacher education in many different ways. As with distance education more generally they can facilitate flexibility in time and place of learning, but the range of persons and resources that they can bring to the teacher's computer screen are also introducing many new scenarios into what is meant by ‘teacher education’. In this review, nine cases of such new scenarios are briefly considered. Issues common to them are also discussed and the paper concludes with a suggestion of a problem area for teacher education in contemporary Europe in which currently available networking could play a particularly important role.     

Connecting to the Good Life through outdoor adventure leadership experiences designed for Indigenous youth

Indigenous voices are largely silent in the outdoor education and adventure therapy literature. The purpose of this research collaboration was to understand how a 10-day outdoor adventure leadership experience (OALE) may promote resilience and well-being for Indigenous youth through their participation in the program. The process was examined through a community-based participatory research project that sought insight from the perspectives of one First Nations community in Canada. The OALE was implemented with six different groups for a total of 43 youth participants (ages 11.9–18.7 years) from Wikwemikong Unceded Indian Reserve in northeastern Ontario. Field data were collected from multiple sources including participant interviews, journals, focus groups, and talking circles. Using a critical ethnographic lens, we analyzed the data inductively to understand how the OALE promoted resilience and well-being. We listened to Indigenous voices, adhered to principles of Indigenous coding for thematic content and respected Indigenous ways of knowing for interpreting results. The process of connecting to the Good Life (Anishinaabe Bimaadziwin) or waking up (nsidwaaswok) to the Good Life emerged as the dominant theme. Connecting to the Good Life may offer a simple yet compelling way to understand the net impact of the OALE.